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Here are fifteen burning questions surrounding teams, players and personnel in the National Hockey League heading into the 2014-15 season.

1. Will Mike Babcock re-up in Detroit as he starts his 10th year with the Red Wings or will he play out the last year of his contract as head coach and become the best free agent on the market next July? If so, the Red Wings will bring in Jeff Blashill from their farm team to replace him. Babcock may want to see what’s out there as general manager Brian Burke did when he left a great situation to move to Toronto. Randy Carlyle is a very good coach, but Maple Leafs president Brendan Shanahan played for Babcock in Detroit. Just sayin …

2. How can a Pittsburgh Penguins team with two of the half-dozen best players on the planet — Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin — have just one Stanley Cup? Crosby and Malkin have three scoring titles and two Hart Trophys as MVP, but only one NHL title. Malkin, who was hurt through training camp with an undisclosed injury, is 28, Crosby 27. Their window of winning is still open, but the two centres eat up 30 per cent of the team payroll and there are holes everywhere else. It cries for a trade of Malkin (Crosby is king there) for a goalie, a top-two defender and two wingers doesn’t it?

3. Are the years catching up to Detroit centre Pavel Datsyuk, who is 36 and can’t seem to stay healthy to show off his magical talent? Last year, it was a knee injury which limited him to 45 games. Now it’s a right separated shoulder, even if he should be back by late October. The Wings cannot survive if Datsyuk is on injured reserve continually. Their streak of 23 straight playoff berths could be in major jeopardy.

4. Speaking of squandering talent, how about Washington Capitals captain Alex Ovechkin, who may be moving back to left-wing under new coach Barry Trotz after Adam Oates had him on right wing. All those goals (422) mean zip with zero Stanley Cups on his resume and not even a trip to the semifinals. Should Ovechkin call up Steve Yzerman, who had to change the way he played in Detroit to get three Cup rings? I’m betting Trotz will work wonders for Ovechkin.

5. Will anybody give the winningest goalie of all-time, Martin Brodeur, work after he went the free-agent route this past summer with no takers at age 42? This is not the way to go out, although I keep thinking the San Jose Sharks will eventually call because of Brodeur’s ties with Larry Robinson, who works for the Sharks.

6. Will this be the year Drew Doughty finally wins the Norris Trophy or is he all about the team and would rather party with the Stanley Cup any day in the summer than pose with the defenceman’s trophy at an awards show? If you polled 30 general managers on who the best defencemen in the game is, at least 20 would say Doughty, but they don’t vote.

7. Can the powerhouse St. Louis Blues go deep in the playoffs with a goalie tandem of Brian Elliott and rookie Jake Allen, even with the best defence in the league? Combined they make a paltry $3.3 million ($2.5 million for Elliott, $800,000 for Allen). Or will they forever be cursed to play the Los Angeles Kings’ Jonathan Quick early in the post-season?

8. Is Brad Richards really the answer as a No. 2 centre for the Chicago Blackhawks to take the heat off Jonathan Toews or will they eventually see that Finnish rookie Tuovo Teravainen is the answer? Richards has a Cup ring and Conn Smythe Trophy from Tampa Bay, but that was 10 years ago. He struggled to produce in New York on a Rangers team that wasn’t as good as Chicago.

9. Is there any way the Buffalo Sabres don’t get the first or second pick in next June’s draft and take the can’t miss centre kids, Connor McDavid or Jack Eichel? The best way to ensure it would be to call up the farm team goalie in the last week if need be, like Pittsburgh did 30 years ago when they had Vincent Tremblay up to make sure they got Mario Lemieux. Tremblay dressed like a goalie but couldn’t catch the puck.

10. Is Anaheim Ducks’ U.S.-born goalie John Gibson really a young Brodeur? Everybody seems to think he’s a slam-dunk as Calder Trophy winner as best rookie if he plays 50 games with good numbers. We know one thing: confidence is not an issue with Gibson. He’s got lots of it.

11. What will the game’s ultimate rink rat, Ryan Smyth, do now that he’s not in a dressing room? He says he needs a year off to decompress after retiring, but nobody likes being out on the ice more than Smytty. Nobody would be surprised if he’s showing guys how to deflect pucks at Oilers practices after the New Year.

12. Will Colorado’s Nathan MacKinnon be a 40-goal, 80-point player this season now that he’s put on some extra muscle to go with the fastest feet in the game today? Nobody pushes people back off the rush like the 19-year-old, who stunned veterans last year with how he made plays at warp speed. He could be the next Crosby, and not just because both are from Cole Harbour, N.S.

13. Can the Sedins recover their offensive wizardry in Vancouver after a mediocre seasons when neither Henrik nor Daniel stayed healthy? They played too much (almost 21 minutes a night under old coach John Tortorella) and neither had even 50 points, the first real blip on the screen as they turn 34.

14. Zdeno Chara’s game showed some erosion as the season wore on in Boston last year. They can’t keep playing him almost 25 minutes a night, not at 37, can they? Nicklas Lidstrom stopped killing penalties as the years advanced in Detroit. Chara didn’t have enough left in the tank in the playoffs last spring.

15. Which coach is most on the hot seat? Paul MacLean in Ottawa, Jack Capuano with the New York Islanders, Randy Carlyle in Toronto or Dallas Eakins, who definitely needs a strong start for his Oilers. I’d say all four of these coaches have to be over .500 in the first 20 games.

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